Top 8 smoked mackerel
Packed with protein, it also comes with Omega 3 fatty acids which help with heart and brain health as well as the reduction of inflammation.
A mainly locally produced food, it is easy to store and can be frozen.
Eat cold or warmed up, added to a tomato sauce to serve with pasta, couscous or rice. I love it with warm new potatoes and a little horseradish, as suggested by Karen Austin in the Lettercollum Cookbook. Delicious.
Mix with cream cheese or crème fraiche to make an easy paté — mash together or use a blender — adding a little lemon or lime juice or horseradish sauce for extra zing.
It will keep for a week and is very handy for picnic sandwiches, and on crackers for nibbles.
For an easy lunch, try flaking the mackerel on top of washed and dried lettuce leaves with finely chopped spring onion and thinly sliced raw beetroot — colourful and nutritious.
The packaged brands will keep in their vacuum packs for about a month. Once opened, it’s best to eat immediately.
Otherwise, freeze straight away in properly sealed bags to keep in strong scents. Whole mackerel is best taken off the bone and frozen in sealable bags.
200g €1.79 (€8.95/kg)
These peppered smoked mackerel fillets (no plain available) come from Scottish fish and are soft and tasty, with no crust on the upper part. The pepper is not overdone. All tasters liked it. Good value.
Caught off the west coast of Ireland, the mackerel is labeled as wild — but, as there is no farmed mackerel, it seems unnecessary to point this out on the packaging. Pale in colour, it has a soft texture with no hard edges. Tasty and not over salted. Liked by all tasters. Good on toast.
Two fillets cut lengthways of Scottish mackerel are flavoured with honey and whiskey. We could taste the honey, but not the whiskey. A nice, soft texture with no edges, it was quite sweet so best suited to having on crusty bread or in a salad with grated carrot, onion and beetroot. Expensive.
Caught in the North East Atlantic, this mackerel is quite chewy on top, but underneath is nicely soft. Not too salty, a pleasant product.
This Scottish mackerel is lightly salted and has quite a different taste to other samples, perhaps a different wood is used for smoking.
The top of the flesh is quite tough and chewy.
Very similar to Centra’s offering (at €20.56/kg), the mackerel has a crust on the upper skinless part which makes it a bit chewy. The taste is quite salty.
This whole mackerel is soft and can be easily mashed to spread on toasted sourdough for a satisfying lunch or picnic snack. Beautifully balanced smoking of Irish fish is done in Belvelly, Co Cork. Fair price for top quality. From stall at English market, Cork.
Whole mackerel is deliciously mildly smoked and has a soft texture. While one taster didn’t like to see bones, we found them in filleted mackerel too. In a perfect world it would come from Ireland, not France where this is smoked. Fair price. From stall at English market, Cork.
